Over the Thanksgiving Day long weekend, one of the many activities I did with my wife and kids was heading out into the countryside to go apple-picking.  After spending some time foraging for the best apples from the wide variety offered within the orchard’s groves, we decided to take a short break at one of the many playgrounds found around the orchard.  While my wife went off to purchase some of the local, freshly made treats being sold at one of the farm’s shops, I found us a picnic table on which to place our sizable share of apples as our children ran off to enjoy the large wooden playground nearby.  Waiting for her to return, I soon found myself mesmerized with watching my girls play; of seeing them taking turns sharing the rocking-horse swing and leading each other in and around the playground fort.  It was a simple moment and yet at the same time, it helped to shine a light on what all those daily struggles during the work week were for. Click here to continue reading »”Savouring The Bounty of Our Lives”

The first time I met my maternal grandfather I was eleven years old, on a trip to visit the homes and places where my parents grew up and lived before moving to Canada. Sadly, it also turned out to be the only time I got to be with him as two months after our return home, he died from a brain aneurysm. While the news hit me hard, what I remember most from that fateful morning was the sounds of my mother’s mournful and inconsolable weeping, of a daughter crying out to her father who just mere weeks earlier had held her in his arms to say what turned out to be his last good-bye. Although that trip was the first and only time I ever got to be with my grandfather, as is the case with life, his passing was to be the first of many times where I’d be reminded of the inevitable truth that no one lives forever.

Of course, the loss of a loved one is Click here to continue reading »”Saying Goodbye To The Ones We Love”